


Series Cut Short

by IspeltEclipsewrong



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV), A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe -Vigilante Violet, Catharsis, Fix-It, Gen, Grimdark, Murder, listen you all wanted this to happen just as badly as I do don't lie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2018-12-15 07:27:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11801298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IspeltEclipsewrong/pseuds/IspeltEclipsewrong
Summary: In his cold eyes, Violet saw a frightening premonition. A word that here meant “she knew Count Olaf would destroy her family for their money and he’d do it with no remorse if she didn't stop him.”Dear readers, I advise you to turn back now. There comes a point of desperation our dear Baudelaire orphans must face, and if you care for them at all you will not wish to view it. This is your chance to look away.





	1. The Bashing Beginning

 Cooking was a science, although it was hardly an exact one. There were ratios and measurements to keep in mind,  but one had far more freedom of artistic license than they would have in chemistry. You could eyeball your food until it was cooked how you liked, or experiment with spices, or throw together something completely new to find out how it tasted.    


  The Baudelaires weren’t doing anything so adventurous. Still, the experience was giving them an appreciation for the art. Violet was enjoying herself as she repaired the pasta machine and pounded out homemade dough. It reminded her of when she was young and had received her first tool set and ‘The Huge Book of Small Projects’ as a gift. She liked creating from her own mind, but those instructions had been so satisfying to follow. It was like ticking off boxes in a To Do list. Cathartic.   
  
  It helped her forget about the horrible man in the next room.    
  
  She got into the flow of cooking, cutting the pasta to ribbons, and prayed this spiral of bad luck would end.    
  
_   Yes _ , Count Olaf wanted their money, but she didn’t have to give him a dollar. It was adoption, not ownership. When she came of age, she could adopt her siblings and buy a home of her own. He'd have no hold over her at eighteen and no money to combat the best lawyer wealth could buy. It was a waiting game and nothing more. Plenty of children had terrible guardians before her and it was a sad fact many would have terrible guardians after. She'd just have to deal with the whiny and demanding Count Olaf until then.   
  
  It was better than nothing, after all.   
  
  ...   
  
  It  _ was  _ better than nothing, she assured herself. She kept assuring herself. It was a roof and food and clothing. That would have to be enough, for now, and then they’d never have to see their distant relative again.    
  
 Violet wiped the flour off her hands onto a dish towel and turned around to attend to the stove. She stirred the sauce and listened to her sister singing repetitively. The toddler banged away on a pot with a wooden spoon, not a care in the world for the moment.   
  
  The two eldest children finished up the pasta while Sunny stopped banging on the pot and started chewing on it. Klaus left the kitchen to go set the table and collect the troupe. Violet began to transfer the food into serving vessels. They would survive this. As long as they had each other, they could survive anything. They would be okay.    
  
  My dear readers, I wish I could tell you that everything was going to be okay. I wish I could proclaim that things would be fine for the Baudelaires, for Violet in particular, but I cannot. I wish I could say they lived the next four years in constant annoyance, but otherwise unharmed. I wish that I could say they disappeared in the middle of the night before Count Olaf could cajole a cent from them. I would, but it would be a lie, because Count Olaf wasn’t going to wait four years. He wouldn't wait a week, he was so impatient, and it had already been two days.   
  
  Olaf’s theatre troupe were decent enough. They completely ignored the children while they served dinner, too enthralled with the Count’s speech. They dug into the pasta with enthusiasm which made Violet glow with some degree of pride. At the very least, they didn’t blatantly get in the way like Count Olaf did. It was only a matter of time before Olaf shattered the uneasy peace of the dinner table.   
  
  He took one look at the pasta with his nose scrunching up in clear disgust. His overgrown eyebrows furrowed as he glared at the food like it had insulted his acting skills. “Where’s the beef?” he asked, waving off the noodles like they were about to make him vomit. Which would have been awful, considering the wine on his breath.   
  
  “...Beef?” Klaus replied, confusion on his face. It had come so far out of left field, he pronounced the word like he'd never heard it before.   
  
  “Yes! The roast beef!”   
  
  “We didn’t make roast beef,” Violet explained, “we made pasta. Pasta puttanesca?”   
  
  Olaf blanched. A word that, in this case, does not mean ‘boiled’ but instead means to turn pale. He blanched because he looked again like he would be sick, face crumpling like the skin of an onion. He scoffed.    
  
  “No, no, no! We want roast beef! Look at our guests, they can barely stand to touch such disgusting, foreign food!”   
  
  That was a bald faced lie, but the troupe immediately stopped eating so they didn’t contradict him. A few snuck bites when it looked like his eyes locked onto another member. The children shared a worried look. There was an uneasy churning in Violet's stomach.   
  
  “But…you didn’t tell us you wanted roast beef,” Klaus protested. Count Olaf turned to the boy, every dramatic movement exaggerated with the grace as a spider. It was like watching a dangerous animal behind glass. Only there wasn’t any glass. He chuckled.   
  
  “When I agreed to adopt you, I became your father and, as your father, I am  _ not someone to be trifled with _ .” Klaus shrunk back from the man, giving Olaf some space. The troupe shared a few glances between themselves.   


  “You can’t go easy on children, they need to be taught to obey their elders,” the hook-handed man said quickly. Everyone at the table nodded in agreement.   
  
  “You told them to make dinner-” one of the women said, stuffing her face with pasta.   
  
  “-and all they did was slap together some disgusting sauce,” finished the other, likewise shoveling food into her mouth.   
  
  “That’s what happens with wealthy children,” said the member with the most unflattering haircut, “money is really a corrupting influence.”   
  
  “Well, let’s not get carried away,” Olaf said in a hurry.  He turned towards the eldest child and glared. “I demand that you serve roast beef to myself and my guests!”   
  
  “We don’t have any, we made pasta!” Violet insisted. The baby on her hip gurgled in agreement.   
  
  “ _ And chocolate pudding for dessert _ !” Sunny added.    
  
  Olaf growled lowly, the side of his mouth twisting up in anger. With one fluid motion he plucked Sunny from Violet’s arms before the girl could protest. There was a round of gasps as he started laughing, lifting the baby aloft above his head.    
  
  “Sunny! Let her go!” Violet exclaimed, both she and her brother reaching out to catch the infant if she fell from Olaf’s grip. Sunny wobbled from side to side, the Count’s grip shifting to keep her balanced. Even the members of the troupe, seconds ago agreeing with Olaf, reached out their arms with looks of dismay on their faces. Although, no matter his good intentions, the hook-handed man really shouldn’t have.   
  
  Olaf’s laughter trailed off and he glanced around the table, scoffing at their reactions. “This table’s a mess,” he said, “was hardly a place to put down a baby.” Instead, he set Sunny in the fruit bowl and pushed her out to the middle of the long table away from those gathered. There was a collective sigh of relief.   
    
  “We’re leaving for rehearsal!” Count Olaf announced, “You children are to clean the table and wash the dishes and polish the silver and rinse out all the wine bottles for recycling. Then, you are to go straight to your beds!"   
  
  “You mean our ‘bed’?!” Klaus said. “You only provided us with  _ one bed _ .”   
  
  Olaf gave a put upon sigh like he was a retail worker dealing with a soccer mom and not a monster that gave three children, one of them an infant, one bed. He lowered his wine glass. “If you want another bed, tomorrow you may go into town and purchase one-”   
  
  “You know perfectly well we haven’t any money!” Klaus replied.   
  
  “Mmm- of course you do, you three _ lucky orphans _ are inheriting an entire fortune.” Olaf wasn’t looking at him, clenching his fists against the table.   
  
  “The money our parents left behind isn’t to be touched until Violet-”   
  
  The sound of flesh smacking against flesh, hand to cheek, was deafening. Klaus fell backwards and collided with the wall, landing onto the floor with the force of the hit. The room was silent in an instant, Violet’s horrified gasp and Klaus’ heavy breathing the only sound for miles.   
  
  The churning in Violet’s stomach reached a fever pitch. The acid in her rolled like a wave in a storm, swallowing her heart into the depths of her outrage. Her vision blurred, narrowed, and tinted red as she let out a quiet breath to compose herself.    
  
  It was like Count Olaf had struck  _ her _ . Klaus was her flesh and blood; so, in a way, he had.    
  
  Count Olaf finish his spiel, no one listening to a word he said, and all the troupe scrambled to follow him out the door. Several of them taking the children’s ‘disgusting’ food with them.   
  
  She’d been wrong. Terribly,  _ terribly _ wrong. Olaf wasn’t just awful, not just neglectful and dramatic and demanding, but evil. She watched him walk away from the table, catching his eye for only a moment, and _ looked  _ at him for the first time. She saw something in him now, while he was gloating and in control, that she’d missed before. In his cold eyes, she saw a frightening premonition. A word that here meant “she knew Count Olaf would destroy her family for their money and he’d do it with no remorse”.    
  
    They wouldn’t last four years here. She didn’t want to stay another second! She helped her brother to his feet. A door slammed shut somewhere. This wasn’t better than nothing, she decided, she’d prefer nothing over this. They had to get out of there.

  She was about to order her siblings to grab their things, but what good would running do? The cops would look for them, _ Olaf _ would look for them. He didn’t seem the type to let this go if he would hit a child for serving the wrong meal. Poe would be useless, as he often was, and from what she’d seen all legal hands were tied. There was nowhere to run  _ to _ .

  She was starting to understand she was alone with a monster with no one to help her. The eldest child, she had to protect her family, but how?   
  
  Violet pulled her ribbon out of her pocket without a word, tying back her hair while her brother looked on in confusion. What could she be inventing at a time like this? There was no problem to be solved at the moment besides their general situation and Klaus’ throbbing cheek. The first would need a machine that could turn back time and the second would clear itself up soon. The gears in her mind turned as she considered an angle Klaus didn’t. Hopefully, he’d never have to.   
  
  Violet eyed the doorway the troupe had left through.    
  
  “Don’t worry, Klaus,” she comforted, putting an arm around him and rubbing his shoulder, “I’m going to get us out of here.”

* * *

 

Violet picked up one of the small rocks from the pile Count Olaf had  _ so generously _ left for the orphans. She set it on the window sill out in the cold night air. The room wasn’t much warmer, mind you, but she wanted to be sure. Klaus sat down heavily on the bed with Sunny in his arms, fuming in silence. 

  The atmosphere in the room was tense. What was Violet supposed to say to comfort him? She couldn’t say it was okay, because it wasn’t, and she couldn’t say it would  _ be _ okay because she really wasn’t sure. She couldn’t even tell him what she was planning. Klaus would try to stop her, she was sure, or worse. Help.    
  
  After a few minutes of awkwardly looking at each other from across the room, Violet took the rock and wrapped it in a dish towel she’d taken up to their room. She extended it out to her brother, giving him a weak smile as he took it.   
  
  “It’s not a real ice pack but it’s close. Put it on your cheek, it will bring the swelling down.”   
  
  Klaus nodded and pressed the hard but thankfully cold rock to his face. He bounced Sunny idly as he stared at his shoes and thought. “So,” he said, “you said you were going to get us out of here.”   
  
  “I am,” Violet said, sounding much braver than she felt.   
  
  “What’s the plan?” Klaus moved to stand up, moving the rock from his cheek. Violet took it from him and pressed it back to his face, making him sit back down.   
  
  “Don’t worry about it.”   
  
  “...What?” Klaus asked, laughing. He finally relented and held the rock himself.   
  
  “I’ll handle it. You look after Sunny, get some sleep-”   
  
  “You’re serious.”    
  
  “Klaus-”   
  
  “No!” he protested, voice incredulous. Hurt flashed in his eyes. “Are you honestly not going to tell me? We’re in this together, we never hide things from each other, we’re a  _ team _ !”   
  
  “Not this time. I need you to stay up here, that’s your part in the plan.”    
  
  “I’m not doing that.”   
  
  “Yes, you  _ are _ .”

  “Violet, I’m not going to let you run off on your own while he’s around-”

  “What could he  _ do _ , Klaus ? He needs us for the money, remember? Besides, I’m just going to take a look around for building material. I’ll be fine.”

  Klaus sighed. That was reasonable, too many people scouting would be suspicious, but- “Violet…”

  “I know. Look after Sunny, okay? I’ll be back soon.”

  They stared at each other again in awkward silence. A quiet impasse. Klaus nodded, still uneasy, and laid down.

  “Okay,” he said, “but if you aren’t back by midnight I’ll assume something is wrong.”

* * *

  Violet crept down the hallway, walking along the walls where the floor creaked less. She doubted it was necessary, Olaf would chalk up any noise she made towards the house being old. A word here that mean “in terrible repair and actively falling apart”. She could lead a tone-deaf, three-piece band with head colds down the stairs undetected.   
  
  That tone-deaf three piece band with head colds would still be a better act than Olaf’s troupe. Now that she watched them practice, it was clear how awful they were. No wonder Olaf was desperate for money. The girl tucked herself into a hidden corner as the adults laughed and drank.   
  
  The troupe showered Olaf in praise as they tried to erase his sour mood. Violet was thankful they seemed to be succeeding. No one, not even his supposed friends, wanted to be around him when he was angry. The actors had enough experience dealing with him to solve the issue.    
  
  “You did a- a good job showing those kids. You really put them in their place,” slurred the hook-handed man. The others gave him dirty looks when he brought up the disastrous dinner, but Olaf looked undisturbed.   
  
  “They have to learn that in this house, they obey me. I am the man of the house, and what do men eat? Meat!” Everyone agreed readily.   
  
  “With such a firm hand, they’re sure to grow up well,” said the member who looked like neither a man nor woman. The others started to nod, but Olaf waved the statement off.   
  
  “Only need the one,” he said, taking a swig from his bottle. “I’ll get rid of the others once I have the eldest. Accidents happen, ya know, and that family is already cursed.”   
  
  There was a slight pause before the next round of nods. Violet felt like she'd suffered another blow like Klaus had. Crashing waves, sharp white noise, filled her ears and washed away her thoughts. Physical violence was one thing, but many men had heavy hands. She wouldn't have forgiven Olaf for that, but for this? His words cleared her mind, pulled the blood from her face, and she felt cold.   


  She felt calm.   
  
 A word which, in this case, doesn't mean content or peaceful.    
  
 She squeezed her hands together and pretended she was wringing Olaf’s neck. She breathed in, and out, and popped her ears. She pushed the static from her mind. Listen, she told herself, listen.   


  “Once you marry her, you mean?” asked a woman. Olaf nodded and gestured to the script on the coffee table. ‘The Marvelous Marriage’.   
  
  “Why else would I bother? I’m not exactly over the moon about marrying a prepubescent girl. I already have enough mouths to feed with you lot, I don’t need any more.”   
  
  “Feeding them won’t be a problem with all that cash,” the hook-handed man pointed out. Olaf broke out in uproarious laughter.    
  
  “Like I want to waste money on a bunch of snot-nosed brats!”   
  
  Violet wasn’t stupid. She may not have all the pieces of this plot, but she had the geist. A sham wedding, inheritance from spouses, the legal book across Olaf’s lap. She found out all she needed to know about Olaf’s plan. She slipped out of the room as easily as she’d slipped inside.   
  
  As she climbed up the stairs to her temporary room, she had another premonition. One about herself. Something that here means “she’d keep her family safe from Count Olaf, no matter what it took, and she’d do it with no remorse.”   
  
  She opened and shut the door to their room, as quiet as a church mouse, but Klaus was already awake. Violet crawled into bed as her brother started asking questions.   
  
  “What did you find?” he asked, “Did you find parts for your machine?”   
  
  “No,” she lied, “I’ll try again tomorrow night. We should get some sleep.”   


  Klaus, too tired to question further, nodded and shut his eyes.

* * *

  The next day went like many of the previous ones. An endless list of chores, narrowly dodging Olaf and his wrath in verbal spars, and comforting and plotting with one another. Violet didn’t listen to her brother’s plans much, but not because she thought they were bad per se. She had already made a choice.

  The orphans were well-behaved, too well-behaved, but Olaf was too busy to notice. If he did, he attributed it to the discipline he handed out at last night’s dinner. Violet was quiet in particular, taking an inventory of the materials around the house. A few pieces of wood, some nails, thin rope, and a hammer. Knives and tarps to put down while painting. A closet of cleaning supplies. A window with a thin latch. So many options for an inventive mind.  
  
  The orphans made Count Olaf his precious roast beef. Klaus looked tempted to spit in it, but Violet gave him a dirty look. They served him his food and left to do their nightly chores before Olaf could find something to scold them for. The eldest slipped away under pretense of using the bathroom, collecting her materials in secret. Violet hid them away right on time before Olaf sent the children to bed.  
  
  Klaus offered again to come with her, but Violet said she’d wait a night to avoid any suspicion. It looked like he wasn’t going to believe her, but she looked so… exhausted. And she was. He nodded and went to douse the lights. The children huddled together in their one small bed and Violet kissed her siblings on their foreheads.  
  
  As soon as he and Sunny were asleep, an hour and a half later, Violet slipped out of bed.  
  
   Olaf would still be rehearsing or singing or skinning babies for all she knew right now. Whatever it was he did around this time in his room that made such an awful noise. She got her materials out of their hiding places and headed to the dining room. She eyed the door frame again and nodded in silent agreement with herself.   
  
  She worked swiftly; she couldn't let Olaf catch her. She had one chance at this and one chance only. The device was simple; a wooden arm that would swing down, held in place by string, with a trip wire. She tied a hammer to the end of the arm around Olaf's height. It was a trap that would have causes some amusing slapstick in a cartoon or children’s story.  
  
  This was not a cartoon or children’s story.  
  
  The last thing she needed was bait, which she found in the form of a bottle of whiskey Count Olaf had left in the kitchen for his nightcap. This is a term that means an alcoholic beverage one drinks before bed, but is also a term used in baseball. A fact made eerily ironic, considering how much Olaf’s balding head may or may not resemble a baseball.  
  
  Violet snatched the bottle and whisked it away to the dining room. She squared her shoulders, straightened her spine, and took a deep breath. She stepped over the tripwire and sat at the head of the table, facing the door. All she needed to do now was wait.  
  
  It didn’t take long. Count Olaf was a creature of habit. A phrase that, in this context, means “ _someone vile and predictable who likes to use their ‘terrible pasts’ and general unhappiness as an excuse to mistreat people and has to use substances to sleep at night because they can’t stand themselves._ ” He swore to himself in confusion when he found his bottle missing. Olaf was already tipsy; glasses of wine at dinner and during rehearsal.   
  
  “In here,” Violet called airily. One might think she was being dismissive, but she was finding it hard to breathe. Her heart pounded out the seconds like the clock on the wall. There was no turning back now.  
  
  Count Olaf appeared in the doorway, eyes flickering over the girl. He looked apprehensive, not quite angry yet. There was electricity in the air.   
  
  Violet had thought about different ways to get him to cross the threshold. She thought about apologizing to him for their behavior, asking him to come sit so they could discuss it. She thought about crying, saying how she didn’t even want the money anyways and offering to sign away her rights. Anything to get him in there. In the end, she settled on another option.  
  
  “Why do you-?" Olaf started, stopped, then scoffed in bewilderment. He thought of what he undoubtedly thought was a funny joke a second later, and smirked. "I know I, as your _beloved father figure_ , am a role model to you, but you shouldn't start drinking. Do as I say, not as I do, and all that. Now give it here-"  
  
  “I took it because you’re someone vile and predictable who has to use substances to sleep at night because you can’t stand yourself," Violet said in a bland, even voice. She shook the bottle and the contents swished around to fill the silence that ensued.  
  
   Olaf’s pale, onion-y face went red with rage in seconds. All his little quips and one-liners swallowed up by Violet’s sheer audacity.  
  
  "You don’t deserve to dream, Olaf. Not even nightmares are suitable; if you sleep, it should be permanent.”  


  The orphans were usually more subtle, more pragmatic, but sometimes you needed a direct approach to a problem. Olaf gaped like a dead fish for a few moments.    
  
  “You little- I’ll put  _ you _ to sleep, you rat! Who do you think you're talking to?!” Olaf shouted, stepping forward menacingly. The rope pull forward with his leg and there was a click.   
  
  “You’re never going to get the chance,” Violet murmured. The solution to the problem approached Olaf’s face directly at approximately 450 to 850 N.     
  
   The impact knocked him backwards and laid him out, flat on his back, on the ugly area rug of the hall. The hammer crumpled his nasal bone into his face, sinus and cartilage, until it was completely flat.    
  
  Violet waited for a moment, breath baited. Violet knew the nose to be the face’s natural crumple point, but the poor girl could hope. Unfortunately, one cannot actually shove the nose into the brain with a blunt force impact. Olaf began making an awful wheezing sound after a moment. The sound of a man unconscious, like a snore, and Violet tightened her grip on the bottle.   
  
  She unscrewed the cap and took a generous swig. It looked like she’d have to finish the job herself.   
  
  She got up, knelt down, and pulled out the smock she’d made out tarp from under the table. A tarp is a large piece of plastic-y cloth uses to keep paint from staining things or to keep objects safe from wet weather. It was waterproof. She slipped it on as Olaf started to stir, writhing in pain and gasping for breath.   
  
  She pulled her hair ribbon out, this time putting her hair into a tight bun. Out of the way.    
  
  As Violet strode across the room, she felt numb. It was probably shock but Violet wasn't a doctor. She prayed she wasn’t made for this, wasn’t a monster like Olaf, but she doubted the blood on his hands was for any good reason. Not like hers would be.   
  
  She untied the hammer from the trap and took it in hand. Her body was a heavy ice sculpture. It was an interesting counterpoint to her mouth, burning from whiskey, and her aching heart. Her fury unfurled like a flower in her chest. She grasped it tight for the strength it provided.   
  
  Olaf tried to sit up. She put her foot on his chest and pressed him back down.   
  
  After the first few hits, her stomach unclenched. It wasn’t because she was okay with what she was doing. She had no doubt she’d be getting very friendly with the toilet after this, but because… he looked less like a person. Every hit hid his skin under blood and shattered his features beyond recognition. The sounds transitioned from cracks into thuds into squelches into splats.    
  
  An animal without a head quickly became meat. A human without a face was exactly the same.   
  
  Once the face was gone, he was just…  _ meat _ . It was an apt comparison and she felt ill again. She took a vow of vegetarianism right then and there.

  Olaf had long stopped moving and there were tears on her face when she finished. She tossed aside the hammer onto the rug. To be sure, she pressed her fingers to his throat and waited. She watched him bleed. She had to know he was really gone. The pulse was gone, stayed gone, for a full ten minutes. She had to hurry before rigor mortis set in.   
  
  She wiped off her hands on the rapidly saturated rug, rising onto her shaky feet. She tugged off the tarp, thanking every God there was that no blood had touched her face, and wrapped Olaf’s head in it. She stepped onto the hardwood and rolled the awful man up in the awful carpet. They were made for each other.   


  It was no great loss. After all, the carpet had already been ugly.   


  Violet washed her hands in the kitchen sink and debated where to put the corpse. She could dig a hole and bury him, but not before her siblings woke up. She couldn’t even build a hole-digging machine; it was too late at night, she might wake the neighbours.   
  
  She could throw him piece by piece into the furnace. She dismissed the idea, that would involve cutting him into pieces and she… She couldn’t. She couldn’t even look at him again. Ever.   
  
  She debated throwing him into the ocean, feeding him to animals, and putting him under the floorboards. Violet started to look around the ground floor, looking from something to help her. She had no fear of the police; the world she lived in was one of incompetent and evil adults. If they didn't see Olaf's evil, why would they notice hers?   
  
  No, what she feared Klaus and Sunny seeing him like this. Klaus and Sunny seeing  _ her _ like this, above all else.   
  
  She almost didn’t notice it when she first searched the supply closet, but ended up tripping on it on the way out. It was hidden under another ugly rug. Violet paused and stamped her foot down again.  _ Thunk _ .   
  
  Hollow.   
  
  She dropped to her knees, pulling back the rug. A trapdoor. On the iron door, there were the initials ‘V.F.D’ written. She didn’t take long to ponder it before she was throwing open the hatch. Violet grabbed a flashlight from the shelf, and heading down into the unknown.   
  
  The unknown turned out to be a tunnel of sorts. It wasn’t a sewer, more like… a passageway. A secret passageway. It didn’t look like it’d been used in years if the cobwebs and dust had anything to say. Violet could hear the distant scurry of rats.   
  
  Rats. Vermin that eat garbage, sewage, and dead bodies. A supply closet above that smelt so strongly of chemicals that no rot could pass through. A secret no one had found in years. It was perfect.   
  
  Violet climbed back up the ladder. She set the flashlight onto the shelf on its side, light still shining so she could see. She headed back towards the hallway. Olaf’s body hadn’t moved at all.   
  
  She grabbed him by the feet, making sure the carpet was  _ firmly secured _ . Once she was confident in her grip, she began to drag him. She was glad for the slippery hardwood her siblings and her had waxed today. She was glad she’d been well-nourished until her parents had died. She was glad when she finally reached the closet.   
  
  She overshot the closet door so she could push Olaf into the hole head-first. It was better to be safe than sorry. The bundle didn’t even unravel when he hit the ground. Violet watched him for only a moment before getting back up. She rushed around the first floor to make sure she’d left no evidence.   
  
  The hammer, the tarp, the body. It was all taken care of. There wasn’t even any blood on the floor. The carpet, it turned out, had one redeeming quality: absorbency. She felt almost bad for murdering it along with Olaf.    
  
  The act had been weirdly… clean. All of it. Violet had been expecting a fight.   
  
  She gazed down the open hatch once more, shining the light down into the dark, dark hole of Olaf’s grave.   
  
  “...ashes to ashes,” Violet recited, “dust to dust. Sewage to sewer.”   
  
  She shut the door and bolted it. She paused and tried again; better safe than sorry. She pulled the rug back over it, covering the letters of ‘V.F.D’.   
  
  She turned around and marched towards the stairs, to Olaf’s room, but paused. On second thought, she swung around to collect the whiskey bottle before heading up.   
  
  It wasn’t hard to find copies of his handwriting. It wasn’t even hard to copy his handwriting. What was hard was finding the correct words to use. In his hand, she could say he… left.   
  
  It was a sham, but it would convince the authorities.    
  
_ “To Whomever It May Concern, _ _   
_ _   
_ _   Last night, I came to a very important decision. I do not want to raise children. I, in fact, hate children. This includes the ones who will inherit large fortunes that might have one day make me rich. I hate this city which has no appreciation for my art whatsoever. Most of all, I hate bureaucracy. I have decided to leave this town behind along with everything and everyone in it to start from the ground up.  _ _   
_ _   
_ _  Like a phoenix, I will rise from the ashes and the world will bow before my greatness!  An artist should expect nothing less. I _ _  hereby forfeit my guardianship of the Baudelaire orphans.  _ _   
_ _   
_ _                                                                                                  Sincerely, _ _   
_ _                                                                                                                 Count Olaf” _   


  A sham, and an obvious one at that, but it would fool the necessary people. The acting troupe might see through it but they didn’t seem to like Count Olaf themselves. They also didn’t seem particularly opposed to murder. Her siblings would see through it, but they loved her. Trusted her. She’d say she drove him off and they’d believe her. Or they wouldn’t, but they’d let it go all the same.   


  She drank a bit more from the bottle before heading back downstairs. She set the note on the table and headed out onto the porch to watch the sun coming up. She’d call Poe once business hours started.   
  
  She hadn’t brought her parents back, and things had gotten worse before they would get better, but the misfortune would stop here. If it didn't, Violet would continue to force it to stop. The nightmares and guilt would be there but only for her. Her siblings would be safe.   


  It was better than nothing.

  
  



	2. The Stuck Window

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An alternate ending to the first chapter. Starts off at the last segment.

  The next day went like many of the previous ones.  An endless list of chores,  narrowly dodging Olaf and his wrath in verbal spars, and comforting and plotting with one another . Violet didn’t listen to her brother’s plans much, but not because she thought they were bad per se. She had simply already made a choice. 

 

  The orphans were well-behaved, too well-behaved, but Olaf was too busy to notice. If he did, he attributed it to the discipline he handed out at last night’s dinner. Violet was quiet in particular, taking an inventory of the materials around the house. A few pieces of wood, some nails, thin rope, and a hammer. Knives and tarps to put down while painting. A closet of cleaning supplies. A window with a thin latch. So many options for an inventive mind. 

 

  The orphans made Count Olaf his precious roast beef. Klaus looked tempted to spit in it, but Violet gave him a dirty look. They served him his food and left to do their nightly chores before Olaf could find something to scold them for.  The eldest slipped away under pretense of using the bathroom, collecting her materials in secret . Violet hid them away right on time before Olaf sent the children to bed. 

 

  Klaus offered again to come with her, but Violet said she’d wait a night to avoid any suspicion. It looked like he wasn’t going to believe her, but she looked so… exhausted. And she was. He nodded and went to douse the lights.  The children huddled together in their one small bed and Violet kissed her siblings on their foreheads . As soon as he and Sunny were asleep, an hour and a half later, Violet slipped out of bed.

  There was one area that Violet had neglected to clean during the day.  She’d made sure to give her siblings tasks in other parts of the house whenever they started to head in that direction,  just to keep it dirty . A hallway on the second story next to Olaf’s tower room. She filled a bucket with bottles of cleaning solution and rags, preparing to go there now.

  As she got closer, she could hear Olaf reciting in his room.  He was chewing the scenery, a phrase that here means “was becoming  increasingly dramatic and cartoonish” . Violet supposed he must have thought himself the very height of Shakespearean grace. A tragic figure unappreciated by humanity. Her lips quirked in an unkind smile.

 She unpacked her supplies and got to work. She didn’t bring water to dilute them as that would have defeated the purpose. She’d need the chemical smell soon. She had dosed a surgical mask she’d found in Olaf’s costumes with cheap perfume to spare herself.

 Then she cleaned. It wasn’t hard work but it was tedious. After doing similar actions all day, she wanted this to be over with. She wanted to sleep. She wanted her siblings to be safe from Olaf. She coughed  softly behind her mask and heard an answering cough from Olaf’s door. 

  She poured more washing liquid on the floor, more powered cleaner with bleach,  dangerously close to each other . She avoided standing over it as she didn’t want to poison herself. The coughing behind the door got louder.  She wondered what would be easier; what she was about to do or if she’d waited for Olaf to fall asleep and let him succumb to the chlorine gas .

  Finally, she could hear Olaf storming to his bedroom door. She pulled off her mask and stuffed it in her pocket. She couldn’t let him know this was intentional. She rushed to the window, the one with the latch that stuck, and started  frantically trying to open it. Or, at least, looking like she was trying to open it.

  “You! What are you doing, you stupid girl? What’s that unholy stench?” Olaf shouted, stomping his way down the hall. 

  “I-I don’t know! I forgot to clean this hallway, so I figured I’d do it now. I wanted to be fast, so I mixed some chemicals-”

  “You can’t mix those two, you idiot, you’ll poison the entire house! Don’t you have any sense in your head?”

  “I-I, uh-” Violet cut herself off, coughing. She covered her mouth with her arm, covering her smile when Olaf elbowed her away from the window.

  “Move, let me do it. This window- ah-” He man-handled the handle and pushed against the window, “- it sticks.”

  “I’m sorry,” Violet said, moving away to stand behind Olaf.

  “Ooooh, believe me, you’re going to be sorry. I need my vocal cords in tip-top shape for the play coming up. I’m not going to tolerate some brat almost suffocating me!”

  Olaf shoved against the window harder while hacking and spitting up the chemical-filled air . He had to slam himself into it to finally get it open. The sudden lack of support put him off balance, hanging him half out of the window. He gasped in the clean air and made no move to pull back.

  “Not what I meant,” Violet murmured. He didn’t have time to respond before she’d shoved him the rest of the way out. Head first. He'd  barely yelped before he was hitting the ground, hard, and the sound cut off.

  Violet peered out the window with her hands braced on the windowsill. A puddle of red was oozing ever wider from Olaf’s form. In the dim light of the streetlamps, she could see his head twisted at an unnatural angle. It was ironic how someone so made of stone could turn out to be so delicate.

  She turned away from the gruesome scene; an accident, everyone was sure to agree. She finished cleaning the hallway, with simple soap and water this time, and headed back to her room.

  She slipped into bed beside her siblings and let out a sigh of relief. Tomorrow they’d call Mr. Poe and get a new, kinder guardian. They’d never have to worry about Olaf again.

  She hadn’t brought her parents back, and things had gotten worse before they would get better, but the misfortune would stop here . If it didn't, Violet would continue to force it to stop. Her siblings would be safe. 

  It was better than nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, I ran a poll to see how I should kill off Olaf. Bludgeoning won, so that's canon, but a lot of other methods were popular as well. I hate Olaf so much that I wasn't satisfied killing him off once, and I bet you weren't either, so let's do it again!
> 
> Runner-up method: falling from a window.

**Author's Note:**

> ngl, I've wanted to kill off Count Olaf since I was a kid. I know it's a kid's book so we can't really have our protagonist commit a murder, but it would have been better than watching this dusty fuck kill multiple innocent people. I know we wouldn't have a story then, but... It's nice to dream. I know Olaf has a dark past but honestly? Don't care. I tried to write in Lemony Snicket style, but I don't think I want on enough tangents. 
> 
> (honestly, this fandom is full of grimdark, but it's all on behalf of the villains. Like Olaf succeeding, esp with the marriage bit, and shipping him with Violet and I'm like Stop It. Get Some Help.)
> 
> The story doesn't end here either. Violet dumped Olaf body in a _VFD_ tunnel. It's going to be found by the volunteers eventually. Her family is still going to be assigned a new guardian. Violet might inherit Olaf's henchpeople as his murderer/adoptive daughter. If Violet already killed a man, and the world insists on continuing to be unkind to her siblings, who knows how far she'd go to protect them?
> 
> I don't want to Write this story so much as I want to Read it, but I might if people show enough interest. If not, feel free to write for this AU yourself. 10/10, very cathartic for my vindictive heart, would recommend. 
> 
> I hereby name this AU 'Vigilante Violet'.


End file.
